Many clients and businesses see Instagram as a “black hole” for advertising dollars. When they don’t quickly see sales, they place the blame upon the medium – before they begin to understand it.

This misconception stems from the expectation of immediate results to the bottom line. But businesses need to learn: Instagram is about capturing moments. People don’t open Instagram to find information or deals about your business – they’re there to engage. With interesting, passionate, and beautifully composed content, you’ll find more connections and reactions than what you’d find on Facebook. The key to Instagram’s high click-through rate is in its simplicity – all you have to do is click on the image to ‘like’ it. That’s it. Nothing more.

But why is a ‘like’ valuable? In short, you’re a part of the community, building understanding and appreciation for a brand, just as other individuals are. It’s ‘likes’ and ideas that builds feelings of relatability to all of those within the community. This is contrary to Facebook, where a mandatory profile, and any of it’s posts, are easily dismissed or lost in the feed within the hour.

Each post reflects the characteristics of how people perceive a brand. With each like, users will relate to the authenticity, integrity, and originality. That’s how you build brand ‘keeners’: loyal customers who will also become great advocates for the franchise. That’s why it’s important to build content that goes beyond just mere advertising. It needs to be engaging, interesting, and socially valuable.

Instagram can be a very powerful tool in the brand-building mix. It just takes patience, dedication, and care with your content.